TMC Team

I'm really excited to share that next week, I'll be in Silicon Valley interviewing over 100 companies and personally learning about the state of technology in the hottest tech market in the world. The response to our trip to the west coast has been fantastic. What's amazing is how many companies we'll meet which are relatively new.

Some which I'm sure most of you have never heard of and many which are just out of stealth mode.

They span the range of hot technologies from analytics, cloud and IoT to identity management, speech recognition and of course security.

We have a few slots left so if you have something important to share - like a leading-edge technology you are about to introduce, please reach out ASAP to sfine (at) tmcnet.com.

I think I may have one of the best jobs in the world. I admit it is a bit ADHD-inducing as I get involved in lots of areas from new media to the latest technologies in the market as I run this major media company which is TMC. Not only do I get help influence tens of millions of people online I also get to host live events where I meet many of the readers who frequent my blog and TMCnet - the main web portal of TMC where I am CEO.

But the most exciting part of my job comes twice a year when I give away a car to an unsuspecting attendee at ITEXPO. Next week - Friday Feb 3rd at 1:45 pm at the Miami Beach Convention Center, I get to give the next car away and it will be a Ford Mustang.

Two of the major drawbacks to a perfect cloud-based existence where the browser serves all your needs are speed of remote apps/services and UI flexibility. It just so happens, two news items have coalesced recently to help usher in the post-OS world. You see, while the tech pundits debate the idea of a post-PC world, companies like Google are going a step further and hoping to get rid of the operating system on the tablet, PC, smartphone and just about any other computing device you use.

HTML5 is one of the primary drivers of the flexible new UI allowing truly customizable media to be shown to users.

Why do Cisco and Microsoft have trouble entering new consumer markets and why does Apple have challenges when trying to get into the enterprise server market? According to an article from Rob Enderle, President and Prinpal Analyst, Enderle Group the reason has to do with poor management choices which have more to do with seniority than ability - coupled with starving new products of the resources they need to make it.

I agree with many of the points he makes and the fact Redmond actually decided turd brown was a great color to use when competing with Apple is hard to digest (sorry). But in addition to the thoughts from Enderle I would add there is a positioning challenge facing these companies as well. In today's world where everything seems to revolve around clicks and search ads, most companies don't even seem to know what positioning means.

And its too bad because companies fail every day because they generate lots of leads that won't turn into business.

Then at 2:00pm is Telecom One-on-One, a JS&A Power Networking Event. Bring lots of business cards and the sooner you start planning, the more meetings you can schedule and the more networking you can do.

Dear ITEXPO attendees - thanks again for registering and we look forward to hosting you next week. My team just sent out this email of schedules and happenings from the show and it is so detailed and explains so much that I decided to pass it along. I hope you find it worthy of keeping on hand at the event.